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People often used to stuff old newspapers behind walls and ceilings as insulation.

Decades later, the old papers reappear when someone is doing a reno, and you get a glimpse into another era.

Vern Bethel has a classic newspaper find: a copy of the 1939 model year automobile show special in the Vancouver Daily Province, published on Nov. 29, 1938.

He discovered it in 1956, when he was a 16-year-old kid growing up in an old West End mansion that had been converted to a rooming house.

“I found it under the linoleum,” he recalls. “It had been put under there to level off the floor or whatever.”

Bethel had just purchased his first car, a ’39 McLaughlin-Buick, one of the cars featured in the 12-page section. So he hung onto the supplement and, six decades later, still finds it fascinating.

“Not only does it give you a cross-section of what the cars were, it shows you who were the dealers, most of them long since passed,” says Bethel, 75, who owns the vintage car firm False Creek Motors.

Indeed. The McLaughlin-Buick ad is for the Bowell McDonald Motor Company, which was at 615 Burrard at Dunsmuir.

It was popularly known as BowMac.

“BowMac was Bowell McDonald, and then Bowell McLean,” explains Bethel. “It disappeared, but the BowMac sign is still here (at 1154 West Broadway).”

The McLaughlin-Buick was touted as “the most advanced car in the world.” It boasted a “Dynaflash Valve-in-head Straight-Eight Engine,” “Tiptoe Hydraulic Brakes” and a “New, Roomier Unisteel Body.”

It even had “catwalk cooling,” a “European racing car development by which grilles are set in an attractive contour in the catwalk section of the front end.

“This lowers the entire cooling intake service,” said an accompanying story, “makes for better visibility from the driver’s seat, and promotes cooling efficiency.”

Today, though, it’s the car’s sleek art deco lines that stand out. But then, most cars had graceful deco curves and contours in the late 1930s. Most of the car shots are taken from an angle that shoots up, as in Orson Welles’ film classic Citizen Kane. The angle makes full use of the giant grilles, curved headlights, whitewall tires and suicide doors that were standard in the era.

The term suicide door is slang for a car door that opened front to back, rather than the regular way. Supposedly it was easier to fall out of a suicide door than a regular one when a car was in motion, because the airflow kept a regular door from opening.

They sure do look cool, though, like the vehicles used by bad guys in old gangster movies.

Alas, none of the Thompson submachine-guns favoured by gangsters were offered with the cars. Instead buyers were tempted with modern conveniences such as the “airfoam ride” with “auto-poise control” in the ’39 Hudson, which had a “salon interior.”

The ’39 Chrysler was roomier than previous models — “four inches wider at the windshield” — but could still glide down the road thanks to its “advanced airflow styling” and “dual power overdrive transmission.” The new “handy-control gearshift” had been moved up to the steering column from the floor, which was “convenient to reach and much easier to operate.”

The cover illustration looks like it was lifted from the ad for the 1939 De Soto coupe, which was for sale for $1,333 at Begg Brothers at 1108-1122 West Georgia.

Most of the dealers were downtown, usually in the 1100 and 1200 blocks.

Bingham-Lea Motors sold the Graham at 1219 West Georgia, Dan McLean sold the Nash at 1148 West Georgia and J.M. Brown sold Studebakers at 1128 West Georgia.

Vancouver Motors and A.B. Balderston sold Fords at 901 Seymour and 1190 West Georgia, and Walmsley Motors and Southard Motor Co. sold the Hillman at 1233 West Georgia and 1280 Granville.

The Hillman was the economy car of 1939 — the English car claimed it got 47 miles to the gallon.

None of the buildings that held the dealerships have survived, and neither did Bethel’s old house at 1200 Nicola. But the show itself was held at Seaforth Armouries on Burrard, which is still around.

Today’s Province newspaper is a vastly different product. The modern tabloid is 11¾ inches wide and 12½ inches long, while the Nov. 29, 1938 Province was a giant broadsheet, 17 inches wide and 22 inches long.

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